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Horrible advice: “Just Be Yourself”

Ok so It’s not the worst advice you could get, but it’s definitely down there with some of the most useless advice. When men and women say “Oh, just be yourself and she has to like you for you”, what are you supposed to do?

Being yourself presupposes that there’s only one version of you which isn’t the case for anyone. Think about how you are with your parents, your girlfriend, at work, friends, siblings. With all of them you act slightly different I’m guessing and talk about different things. When you’re having pillow-talk with your girlfriend, it’s probably not the same way you would act when you’re with your friends at the bar watching the Patriots game (subtly sneaking my favorite team in this article).

All of this is ok. Even when you think you’re being you, you’re not really. This has to do with something in psychology they call true self and false selves. Everyone has false selves. They can be good in some cases, but also very bad sometimes too. Depends on what type of false selves you consciously or unconsciously built.

The true self on the other hand most people actually barely know. Many of us are largely unaware of our true self. If you want to see people that are almost all the time their true self look at young children. Their spontaneity and the way they’re not thinking about what they’re saying or doing most of the time is your true self.

We all started off like that and that’s when we’re happiest. But with childhood traumas, big or small which nearly all of us experience, we unconsciously start building false selves to protect ourselves. We have to. As children we have no way to cope with this and we don’t know how, so this is the only way. To repress some of the emotions we’re feeling and can’t handle at that age.

We still experience our true self, some of us more than others. When you cry, really laugh, or when you’re doing something you’re completely in flow with, these are all times that your true self is coming out. You’re not thinking about how you look, what people think, evaluating, or thinking what to say. No, you’re just in the moment and you’re being you.

Some false selves are of course necessary. Your work persona can be something that is needed for your type of job for example. Picking up girls is also a false self that on the surface looks like a good one but can be dangerous if you start thinking or believing that this is your true self. This is why so many PUA’s are depressed as hell or feel empty. All their happiness is tied to this pick up because that’s how they feel self-worth.

One of the best ways to start dealing with these false selves and the ones that you created in childhood is therapy. It’s something I’ve been doing as well since I went down the road of the “PUA” in the past. I realized that I felt empty and emotionally deadened inside because I had all my self-worth tied up with getting women or with a girlfriend. That’s a horribly dangerous path to go down for your emotional health. It lead to me being depressed for a long time and worst of all I didn’t even realize it.

Once you become aware of it and start spending more time with your true self you’ll feel so much happier and your self-worth won’t be defined by anyone except for yourself. When you realize that you can start getting rid of the false selves that aren’t helpful for you and only keep the few that are good for you. You’ll also start being your true self more with women which will attract the type of women you actually want to spend time with and be in a relationship with.

It’s much more fun spending time with women that you enjoy and enjoy you for who you really are. Not for the game playing, pick up front that you put on. No one can keep that up and that’s why PUA’s usually have a hard time staying in long term relationships. They have to game their relationships because they never really let the girl know their true selves.

You don’t want that. Think how much happier and relaxed you would be if you don’t have to remember all these routines, lines, things to do, and that you can just be in the moment. Both you and the girl will be much happier for it.

If you can get a therapist I always recommend doing that and really getting to know your true self while you are also working on getting better with women. This way you learn the skills to be better with women but you realize they’re just skills and not who you are and what your self worth is tied to. You’ll notice if you do this at the same time you’ll learn much quicker and better because your confidence will be innate.

Would love to hear your comments if you’ve had similar experiences. You can also email me and I’ll be happy to help any way I can.